Of Life and Love
by Asshattery-Central
Summary: Futuristic AU. After meeting on a train for the first time in ten years, Tai cant stop thinking about Matt. Then it seems that the DigiDestined get busy. Yamachi. Beware of parent death.
1. Chapter 1

This be futuristic AU-ish. I… don't even know where in the world this came from. Aw well, hope ya'll enjoy.

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><p><em><span>Thursday, July 15<span>__th__ 2111_

Damn but this was weird.

That was honestly the only thought going through his mind at that moment. Or well, the last couple of weeks actually. If he didn't know any better he'd say his guardian angel had decided to dump all the luck in the world on him.

Ten years ago his family had moved away from the city, and now he was moving back there. To the same neighborhood too, ironically enough.

He'd not only been able to get a three bedroom flat (_one of which even had it's own bathroom!_) with a pretty spacious living/kitchen with a _kitchen_ _island_, he'd also gotten a very sweet gig at a popular club/restaurant as a bartender and occasional extra help. Which basically meant doing anything from pitching in as busboy or handyman. For once maybe he could just have _one_ job instead of several and they could still live very well. Maybe he could even take on a few classes at the university later in the fall…

Pfft, as if. His luck never held up. Not for long anyway.

Tai was probably not what was considered a _normal_ 20-yearold. Mostly since he singlehandedly took care of his little sister and one of her friends, the kid had run away from home and had nowhere else to go. Tai had only agreed to let the younger boy stay with them because A; he liked the kid, and B; he never could resist those puppy dog eyes of his sister's. Damn it.

His sister, who he was currently speaking to on his cell, chuckled in his ear at something that was apparently going on somewhere in the background. Tai raised an eyebrow down at his partner who was sitting next to him on the train. Agumon was fast asleep. Figures.

Digimon had been known to the human world for years, but people who were DigiDestined were still quite rare. They were accepted as part of the population though. As long as they did their job of defending the world from evil Digimon that is.

"You seem to be doing well with the friend-making over there Kari.", Tai commented a bit dryly, he didn't really appreciate her calling him and then ignoring him as soon as one of her new friends did something that she found entertaining.

Kari kept chuckling a bit as she spoke. "Yeah! Willis and I found a whole bunch of kids our age that are all 'Destined, and they also go to the same school we're gonna start at! Isn't that fantastic?"

"Sure it is.", Tai smiled a bit as he fingered the goggles on his head. "Just be careful not to draw too much attention to yourselves, a big group of 'Destined and their partners make kind of a big target."

"You worry too much, bro.", Willis' amused tones carried through the receiver. "Which is a very odd thing to say about _you_, really."

"Oh shush you.", Tai tried at a scolding voice, but failed grandly when it came out just as amused as the teen on the other end of the line.

"But in all seriousness, when are you getting here man?"

"Should be there in an hour or so, why?"

"No reason."

"Aaaw, you miss me?", Tai feigned a childish voice and leaned forward with his elbows on his knees.

Willis snorted. "I only miss someone cooking for me is all."

The two teens had been living in the apartment by themselves for a few days while Tai made sure everything about the move had been taken care of. Not to mention that he had a job to pay for them living there.

"Hah, no buying it kid.", the brown-haired man sniggered fondly when he heard an audible smack and a bit of shuffling.

"Don't mind him Tai, he's just sulking 'cause I didn't let him play video games all night."

Tai laughed at that. "'Atta girl!"

He glanced across the coach as he heard some rather loud and obnoxious squeals. There was a group of girls huddling around a sitting form, crowding whoever it was more and more. A frown edged it's way across his face as he got a glimpse of the blond guy sitting there, he looked like he wanted to explode on them but for some reason he just sat there smiling at them stiffly and listened to them gush and coo at him.

"Sorry 'Ri, but it seems there's fellow human being in need of assistance here.", Tai told his sister as apologetically as he could.

Kari snorted, sounding ridiculously like Willis when she did. Honestly, those two were spending so much time together they were practically twins.

"There always is with you."

"And what exactly is _that_ supposed to mean?"

"We can talk about it later Tai, see you then!"

And with that he got the sound of her hanging up in his ear. He scowled slightly at the phone for a second before shrugging and stuffing it back in his pocket.

The atmosphere was now so full of rage around the blond that the people closest had actually moved away to sit at the two ends of the cart. Of course his fangirls hadn't noticed how much he seemed to want to strangle them at all, and simply cooed at him some more.

"Hey, I don't know about you girls but I think some of us here would like some peace of mind.", Tai growled at them as matter-of-factly as he could manage and proceeded to give them an icy death glare.

He must have been getting better at those, if the fangirls' startled looks and fast get-away was any indication. Some of the other passengers sighed in relief.

The blond across from him stared at him in befuddlement, after that followed something that might have resembled recognition, Tai wasn't sure. Then the blond's lips curved up in a little sneer that bugged the hell out of Tai instantly. For what reason he wasn't sure yet…

When Tai further studied the guy, he did get something like a spark in his memory, from what, who, where or when he had no idea. Something caught his eye to the left of the blond and at further inspection it appeared to be a Gabumon. Huh. So this guy was a 'Destined too?

"So, music or movies?"

At Tai's off-hand question the blond blinked for a few moments, frowning a bit.

Tai wasn't really expecting an answer, so he went ahead and leant back in his seat and stretched his arms out over the backrest. He only asked because it seemed reasonable that the blond was doing something to put him on the map.

Silence covered the space between them, the guy's Gabumon kept shooting glances at Tai out of the corner of his eyes. A strange mixture of curiosity and suspicion evident in them. Agumon was still snoozing soundly and had taken to leaning against his human's side. The human in question stretched his legs out on the floor and crossed them at his ankles, giving his partner a fond half-smile.

"Music."

The word came a bit out of nowhere, so it took a while for Tai to register that it had been directed at him. The brunette looked back to the blond who was now observing him with something like feigned detached interest. Or at least Tai was _hoping_ it was feigned.

"What kind?"

A pause.

"Rock mixed with blues mostly."

Another pause.

"That's cool. Would love to hear it sometime."

_Man_ that was such a lame thing to say, but he couldn't come up with anything else. The blond seemed to think so too, though it was hard to tell with that unreadable look.

"Maybe if you play your cards right you will."

Tai did a bit of a double-take at that, the tone it was said in especially. Did the guy just…? Did he just…? _What_?

He ignored the slight smirk the blond was directing at him in favor of plastering his most charming grin on his face. "Well in that case I'm golden, seeing as how I usually clean house when I play cards."

After that they dove right into a number of subjects, discussing whatever came to mind and just generally talked through the entire train ride. They exchanged opinions the way two strangers who didn't know each other's names could, with no strings attached. Though Tai felt like he'd known the guy for a lifetime.

There was a sort of comfortable air about the blond that Tai thoroughly liked; it was like he could talk to him about anything. Something that he kind of missed in his life…

"Uh, Tai?"

So much for the guy not knowing his name. The brown-haired man cut himself off in the middle of praising a game he'd been addicted to for over a year and turned to gaze at his partner expectantly.

"Yeah Agu' what's up?"

"Isn't our stop coming up?"

Tai glanced outside the window behind the blond and then to the monitor displaying which stops came next. It saddened him a bit that the Digimon was right.

"Well, looks like we'll be getting off at the next one…", Tai told his conversation buddy just a tad ruefully.

The blond smiled, _he had a very lovely smile that one_, and dragged a hand through his hand. "Looks like…"

An awkward silence fell over them then. Tai would've continued from where he was; only he couldn't remember what he had been talking about.

"I just have to ask, before you get off, have we met before?", the blond leant forward on his knees and gazed at Tai solemnly.

The brown-haired 'Destined could've sworn he saw an odd fire alight in the other man's electric blue eyes.

"Uh… I don't know. Maybe? I get the feeling we might've.", Tai said and put his elbows on his knees again and adopted the same pose as the blond.

The man opposite Tai nodded seriously. "Yeah… I get that feeling too."

Tai smiled brightly as something fluttered around his torso. "Maybe if we see each other again we can find out?"

"I–"

"**NEXT STOP: HIGHTON VIEW TERRACE."**

The blond snapped his mouth shut when the speakers announced the next stop loudly across the cart. They stared at each other for a few moments as the train slowed down, Tai knew Agumon was looking between him and the other 'Destined and his partner in puzzlement.

The train stopped and the doors slid open. Tai hesitated slightly before he rose to his feet; he hadn't broken eye contact with the blond yet. He found that he didn't want to.

Tai grazed the other 'Destined with a brilliant grin. "I'll see you around, I hope."

"Yeah…", the blond smiled, looking at Tai in an expression of mild wistfulness that the brown-haired man failed to see as he exited the train with Agumon in tow.

Thoughts were running wild in Tai's head immediately after he left the train, and they didn't stop. Agumon kept shooting him concerned glances.

"Tai, are you okay?"

"Sure I am, why do you ask?"

"Well… you have your brooding face on…"

"So?"

"_So_, when you brood you get depressed."

Tai stopped short in the middle of the sidewalk, earning a few curious looks from passers-by.

"What? I don't always get depressed when I brood."

"Yeah, you do. The others would probably testify to that too.", the Digimon wasn't backing down.

Tai frowned. "Where is this coming from?"

Agumon heaved a sigh and started walking again. "Never mind."

* * *

><p>"Matt?"<p>

Gabumon was being ignored. He hated it when his partner did that.

"Matt?"

His partner had been still ever since that other DigiDestined left. He'd just been sitting there, staring out the window opposite to where they sat.

"Matt, for crying out loud."

Not a word. Not _one_ single reaction. In thirty minutes. Gabumon really couldn't stand it.

"Matt!"

The blond finally seemed to catch himself and visibly started before looking down at his partner.

"Huh, what? What is it Gabu'?"

The Digimon grit his teeth. "Seriously? Matt, you've been sitting there staring at an empty seat for _thirty_ minutes."

"It's been thirty minutes?"

"Since he left? Yup."

"Huh… well, he was… interesting."

Gabumon stared at the blond for a moment. Then he shook his head at the utterly unreadable expression on Matt's face and the feather light blush dusted across the blond's cheeks.

_Oh this _can't_ end well…_

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><p><em><span>Friday, July 16<span>__th__ 2111_

Damn it.

Why couldn't I stop thinking about him? I just _met_ him yesterday_, on a train_ for heaven's sake. But I couldn't help it; there were so many questions I didn't get to ask. What's his favorite color? What did he like to do on lazy days? How long had he been with his Digimon? Had we _really_ met before?

Damn it.

Is this what Agu' meant before…? I don't brood. Much. Do I?

"Oh Tai _darlin'_!"

I turned from where I was restocking my station at the club to where Mimi was approaching quickly. Funny thing, turns out there were a few people in the city that I did know. Mimi was the only one I had met with as of yet, granted we hadn't seen each other since I was ten but back then she, a couple other kids and me were quite close.

Just so happened that her parents owned the club. Mimi also happened to be my 'station buddy', so to speak. See, at the Pink Palmtrees you had two bartenders at each station and those two were meant to entertain the guests with their 'specialty'. Whatever the hell that actually meant I had yet to find out.

"Hey _guuuurl_!", I exclaimed overdramatically and wrapped her in a one-arm hug, as my other hand was busy holding a box of pineapples.

I loved playing at acting gay-er than I was. Which really wasn't that difficult.

"How're you settling in sweetie?", Mimi smiled brightly at me as we pulled apart and I went back to stocking one of the many cabinets with fruit.

I shrugged. "Just fine I suppose, it's still really weird to move back like this after all these years."

"I can imagine.", the pinklette hopped up onto the bar and gazed solemnly at me. "I'm glad you're back though, things were never the same after you guys left."

I looked up at her, a tad surprised at the sudden change in her mood, and rose to my feet to lean in and give her a peck on her cheek. "Well, we're back now. I just hope things'll turn out okay."

Mimi's lips curved into a smile again. "Of course they will! And I can't wait to introduce you to the rest of the gang! They're gonna be _thrilled_ to have more DigiDestined to hang out with!"

I returned the smile, albeit a bit uneasily. "I hope you're right, I wouldn't mind making some more friends."

She giggled as my wild hair tickled her hairline. "They're gonna _love_ you, trust me."

Somehow I doubted that, other than Kari and Willis, interacting with other 'Destined was still fairly new to me.

We dropped the subject there, goofing off on the dance floor instead. It was early, and the club wouldn't open to the public until two hours later and the rest of the bar crew had yet to arrive, but that didn't mean we couldn't have some fun in the mean time.

Agumon was sitting on our bar-station with Mimi's partner, Palmon, both of them looked at us like we were insane while we danced and wrestled.

Of course, the wrestling went more like Mimi pounced on my back and tried to drag me down while I fought to stay standing. We were both sweating and laughing like crazy by the time we had company in the room. The two of us didn't notice a thing, our Digimon looked at us reproachfully. Suppose I can't blame them, at least _I_ should've been more aware than that.

But I was too busy having fun to care.

A chuckle brought our attention to the newcomers from our spot on the floor where Mimi was straddling my waist and was trying to get me to give in by tickling me ferociously. She could keep trying, I'd been subject to the same treatment ever since Kari was born and then Willis came along and there was two of them, which made it way unfair.

"This is certainly a surprise."

"Sora! About time you got here.", Mimi shot up from my abdomen and threw her arms around the other girl's neck.

It was like a light bulb went off in my head. Or more like it exploded.

"_**Sora**_? Wait–", I got to my feet and approached them to further scrutinize the woman in Mimi's chokehold. "Not _the_ Sora? The one whose hat I threw up in and didn't tell her before she put it on?"

My tone was incredulous when I spoke, but I couldn't help it. It'd been so long since I'd seen her, and back before the move she was my best friend.

She smiled good-naturedly at me. "The very same Tai, Mimi told me she had a surprise when I got here but I never expected _this_."

I beamed at her and returned the hug as she wrapped her arms around me. "_Man_ it's been a long time."

Sora chuckled. "I hope you didn't miss me _too_ much, and to think that we're all 'Destined now too, we have more in common than I thought."

"Huh?", I glanced around her as she released me, and sure enough, right behind her was a Biyomon. "Oh! Hi there!"

"Hello.", the Digimon was looking at me with the same cautiously intrigued expression as that blond guy's Gabumon had before.

_The blond with the piercing blue eyes and fascinating smile and– _

And _god damn it_ all! I had actually managed to _stop_ thinking about him and now there he was again… Fuck!

"Don't mind her, she's a little shy around strangers.", Sora told me and kept smiling at me with something akin to fond nostalgia.

Suppose that did make a lot of sense though…

"That's okay, I can sympathize.", I gave the pink birdlike Digimon an understanding grin and turned over to the bar where my own partner was staring at the newcomers. "Hey Agu', come over here and say hello."

Agumon looked up at me and got off the counter, sauntered over to me and waved a bit awkwardly. "Hi…"

I raised an eyebrow at him, I swear I tried to remain all stoic-like, but the sudden love struck look on his face was so priceless I couldn't stop from sniggering like an idiot even if I'd have wanted to.

He glared at me. "**What?**"

"Pfft! I forgot you have a thing about _pink_.", oh but I just had to tease him. I had to, it's in my nature.

"_**Shut up**_! I do not!"

Agumon crossed his arms and turned away from me with an indignant 'hmph'. That only served to make me giggle all the more. I stopped when he turned around abruptly with his right claw withdrawn and ready to hit me.

"Alright, alright _lover-boy_.", I conceded with my hands raised defensively.

The orange lizard narrowed his eyes at me for a moment and then stomped off towards the door, probably to go home and complain to Kari about how I was picking on him again.

I cleared my throat at the un-amused looks on the girls' faces. "Well it's true, he does. He just wont admit to it."

Sora sighed and shook her head; when she gazed at me she wore that fond expression again. "I'm glad some things never change."

It was my turn to narrow my eyes. "And what's _that_ mean?"

"Oh nothing!", she chirped as she wrapped me in another hug and pecked me on the cheek. "I gotta go anyways, I'll see you Monday afternoon Mimi! Try and get the _blockhead_ to come too, will you?"

"No prob!", Mimi waved goodbye to her friend and Biyomon as they disappeared out the door.

"Um, what's Monday afternoon?", I asked as we went back to our station to finish preparations.

"Show up at the Highton View Park at three and you can see for yourself.", the brunette chirped with a wink.

I frowned slightly, Palmon simply shrugged when I glanced down at her.

_Well… this is bound to be interesting._

* * *

><p>I changed the perspective and POV there 'cause Tai is more fun to write like this.<p>

Ahem.

Gonna go watch Digimon and relive my childhood a bit now.

BAI.


	2. Chapter 2

Low and behold, AN UPDATE. Amaaaaaaazing. Ahem… *goes to cower in a corner*

Oh and the song he's referring to with the wiggle thing? Yeah, I think ya'll can guess what song that is. *smirk* This may be further in the future, but that's mostly for the more advanced technology, other than that the culture is basically the same. With a few changes to suit my fancy.

'Kay, I'll be shutting up now.

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><p><em><span>Monday, July 19<span>__th__ 2111_

One weekend in and I already wanted to murder the DJ and make it look like suicide.

Though I think that's highly acceptable if _The Kid_ – in more than one meaning of the phrase – uses the same flippin' song about a _zillion_ times in the same mix. _For three fucking nights in a row_. One can only stand hearing the word '_**Wiggle!**_' in _that_ context with _that_ beat so many times in that fairly short span of time.

I breathed a sigh of relief as I pushed my key in the lock of the apartment, opening the door as silently as I could, locked it behind me after shutting it again and nearly toppled over when my feet hit a small mountain of shoes. Staring down at them in exhausted bewilderment as it took me a moment to remember why the hell there was so much footwear in the house.

_Oh yeah… Kari and Willis have their new friends over…_

"Guh…", I groaned softly and rubbed a hand over my face as I took in the state of the rest of the place.

It was a mess. A proper _chaotic_ mess. Complete with socks on the kitchen counter and pizza boxes littered all over the place and everything.

_Guess this is what Willis meant when he said it was chaos over here on the phone before._

'Before' being five hours earlier, when it was around midnight and I had managed to extract myself from the bar and dance floor for long enough to check up on my charges.

"I sure as hell ain't cleaning this up tomorrow… or uh, later today.", I grunted as I nearly tripped over some of the couch pillows that had been strewn around the living room.

_God damn it Kari. _

Standing still for a moment in front of the couch, which I planned to crash on, I strained my ears and listened to the soft snoring coming from Willis' room and the light murmuring from Kari's room. I couldn't resist the smile that edged its way onto my face as I unbuttoned my black shirt and slipped the belt out of my equally black pants.

_At least they had fun. I hope. They'd better have, or there's some serious explaining to be done about the state of this place. _

I dropped down on my back on the couch and closed my eyes, hearing the door to Kari's room predictably open ever-so-slightly and a pair of clawed feet padding over to me I let the corners of my lips curl up a bit further. When I felt a weight on my hair I cracked an eyelid and gazed wordlessly at my partner, he seemed a bit at odds with himself about something. Making an educated guess I lifted my arms into the air, the Digimon smiled mildly at the silent invitation and promptly climbed on top of my torso, falling unconscious almost instantly.

I chuckled quietly. "You big lapdog.", whispering fondly as I put my right hand behind my head and the other on Agumon's head and petting it lightly I let sleep claim me.

* * *

><p>Now, one thing anyone who's remotely familiar with me knows is that when I'm exhausted and deprived of rest I sleep like the dead. Or well, I actually do that most of the time when I sleep but <em>nonetheless<em>, I am _not_ a morning person. At all.

So when I started drifting back to the world of wakefulness and the smell of precious _coffee_, naturally I opt to stay put for a while to become at least a _bit_ coherent. Now that we had guests and all, I supposed I had to make a little effort.

It was then that I heard someone giggle softly above me, or maybe it was more than one person, I couldn't be sure. I hadn't had my coffee yet.

It took me all of three seconds to conclude what the continuous clicking noise was, and it took me another five to crack my eyes open and gaze sullenly at my little sister hanging over the back of the couch and grinning at me maniacally.

"Kari.", I said as sternly as I could manage in my state of being barely awake. "Get that camera outta my face before I throw it out of a window. Again."

She at least had the decency to look sheepish. For about a split second. Then the obnoxiously smug grin was right back.

"But you're so photogenic 'Chi, and you wouldn't do that more than once a month. There's a limit to how much you're willing to spend on repairing stuff _you_ break.", Kari told me very matter-of-factly and snapped another picture.

I took to glaring at her tiredly, berating myself internally that her kind of not-so-discrete compliment in there actually got to me.

_Hang on… did she just…?_

I groaned and rolled over onto my side, still holding Agumon who was very much fast asleep. "Don't call me that in front of people 'Ri."

She snorted and to my irritation I heard the camera click again. "I'll stop as soon as you do."

Sighing I opened my eyes and glowered at her. "Fine, whatever, now go away.", I shut my eyes again and proceeded to drift around the fringe of my consciousness some more.

"Nope.", was the cheerful response, another click and I felt something like body heat in front of my face.

I let out a frustrated noise, expecting to be met with my sister's face behind a camera when I next opened my eyelids. What did meet my gaze was neither sister nor camera. It was someone I had never seen before. Or wait… had I seen him before?

"Oh my god! I can't believe I'm in _the_ Taichi Yagami's apartment! I _slept_ in his apartment!", the kid leapt up straight and started jumping around the room while happily declaring a bunch of nonsense.

This intrigued me so that I sat up to stare at him in astonishment, noting that there were two other unknown kids sitting at the kitchen island and Willis was by the stove flipping pancakes. That was when it hit me. Hard. Although it could've been Agumon's claws digging into my back, silently urging me to move closer to the delicious smells emanating from the kitchen area no doubt.

I slapped a hand to my forehead, both in exasperation and to wake myself up a bit more. "Oh _god_… are you that same kid from the soccer meet who wouldn't stop talking?"

The burgundy-haired teen stopped just long enough to shoot me a wide grin and say, "You bet! I'm your biggest fan, remember?"

"Kinda hard to forget…", especially considering how pushy he'd been about getting to know me back at that meet and then knowing what I was gonna do after I finished high school. "Davis was it?"

The teen froze in his tracks right beside Kari and stared down at me wide-eyed, a blush building on his cheeks and his grin growing by the millisecond. Looks like I just made his day. _Great_.

"Y–you remember my name?"

_Ugh… it's too fucking early for this…_

"Sure, I tend to remember pushy and obnoxious people for future reference.", I told him with a bright smile as I got up from the couch, Agumon clinging to my torso still, and snatched the camera out of Kari's grasp while she was busy laughing when Davis' face fell.

"Oh…", the kid said, rubbing his arm dully.

I glanced at the other two new people, one blond guy and a purple-haired girl. The two of them just looked mildly amused and barely interested. So this sort of behavior was normal? Seriously? I would've laughed if Davis hadn't been so sad-looking.

"Don't worry about it though.", chuckling I ruffled his hair up a bit as I passed on my way over to the counter where my beloved coffee was brewing, successfully keeping the camera out of Kari's grasp as I went. "The pushy and obnoxious are my kinda people."

I sent him a wink as I twirled around when Kari reached around me to grab the camera back, slamming Agumon into her and making the orange lizard glare at me disapprovingly all at once.

That seemed to cheer the kid up, judging by his huge grin returning full force. Glancing at the two newcomers whose names I had yet to be given, I could tell that they were observing Kari's and my behavior with great interest as I backed into the kitchen holding the camera up over my head so the petite brunette couldn't reach it.

_Hah, still taller than you kiddo, _was the general message of the smirk on my face. She seemed to catch on and proceeded to remove Agumon from me and set the very confused Digimon on the kitchen island, only to jump up and wrap her legs around my waist to try to get higher so she could get her blasted camera back.

This, of course, only served to make me guffaw so badly I almost doubled over. I didn't lower the hand I was holding the camera in though, to Kari's annoyance.

"Give me it!"

"Nope!"

"I _swear_ Tai if you don't give it back right now you'll regret it!"

"And what exactly are you gonna do that you haven't done yet?"

"… I don't know! Turn all your white clothes _pink_!"

"You've done that."

"I'll hide your Digivice so you can't find it for a week!"

"Done that too, _twice_ I believe."

She was running on empty, we both knew it, but we were still grinning like mad and we were fully aware of the eyes on us. Davis had stopped again and was clutching at his shirt tightly, staring at us in complete bewilderment. The blond dude and the purple-haired girl were staring at us with more or less the same expressions, while Willis went about setting out plates and distributing pancakes.

It wasn't until the camera clicked and flashed and Kari and I started laughing like crazy that Willis finally seemed to have had enough. He nabbed the camera out of my hand, tossed it over onto the couch and smacked us both over the backs of our heads.

"If you two are done with the childishness, can we eat?", even as he said this he went to sit at the table on the other side of the kitchen island.

Kari and I giggled stupidly while she let go of me and followed Willis to the kitchen table. Their new friends were still staring at me though. This time it seemed more like they were scrutinizing me for something. It made me a bit uncomfortable to be honest. I ignored it and shot the three of them a brilliant smile, making my way over to the coffeemaker.

"So...", I poured a mug full and then dropped about seven lumps of sugar in it, stirring in the brew as I turned to lean my lower back against the counter. "I take it you guys had fun last night?"

To put emphasis on what I meant I gestured around the apartment with my spoon, lowering my eyelids and smirking knowingly at my two charges who immediately froze when they realized that they had yet to clean up the absolute mess.

Kari cleared her throat a bit awkwardly. "We uh… we're gonna clean the place up I swear."

I narrowed my eyes at her. _Not telling me huh?_

"What happened to your hair by the way? I know it's usually kind of a birds nest, but it's wilder than I've ever seen it dude.", Willis pointed at my head with his fork and raised a questioning eyebrow.

"Huh?", my own brows shot up momentarily and I raised a hand to my hair. He was right; it was way messier than usual. "Oh… right. The girls at the club thought it was a fantastic idea to initiate me into the staff by dumping a bucket of jelly on top of my head. I thought I managed to rinse most of it out though…"

The blond snorted a laugh. "Wow, I kinda wish they'd taken a picture of that."

I glared at him. It didn't take long for him to piece things together by the awkward way I was staring out the kitchen window and rubbing at the back of my head.

"They did, didn't they? Oh my god, where can I find it?", Willis shot up from the table and rushed into his room for his computer.

"Like I'm about to tell you.", I snorted and lifted the mug up to my lips, holding it there and speaking behind it. "Who are these other two young people I have the pleasure of meeting?"

When they realized I had asked about them, the two teens in front of me stiffened, glanced up from their plates and then at each other before their eyes darted back to me.

Kari sneered a bit abashedly. "Oh sorry, I forgot to introduce you. This is Yolei."

At being addressed the purple-haired girl put her chin in her left hand and waved with her right. "Hi, I really must say that you have _very_ nice abs."

I blinked a bit stupidly at the sudden comment, I looked down at my chest and well-toned abdomen and up again with – to my ever-lasting vexation – a slight blush blooming over my cheeks.

"Uh… thanks?"

"And you remember TK right? He lived in our neighborhood and we went to kindergarten together before we moved."

"Wait, the same kid who you tried to shave and paint our cat with?", the grin growing on my face seemed to be contagious since the blond teen mirrored my expression almost instantly. Unless of course he found the memory of that particular day as entertaining as I did.

"The one and only.", TK declared cheerily. "And Yolei, he's an athlete. You expect him to be all skin and bones?"

"Nope.", Yolei twirled a lock of her hair between her fingers and directed a lewd smile at me.

Kari got up from the table to put her dishes in the sink and paused by the purple-haired teen to point an accusing finger in Yolei's face.

"No.", my sister told her simply in a grave voice.

"What do you mean 'no'?", the purplette asked indignantly.

"My brother is so off-limits it's not even funny my friend.", Kari continued speaking stoically and patted my arm as she passed me.

I sniggered lightly at her choice of words.

"Who says I'm interested?", Yolei went on saying, undermining her own statement magnificently by leering very blatantly at my chest again.

"The look on your face does, and the fact that you keep staring at–"

"I'm standing right here you know!", I exclaimed and poked Kari's shoulder.

"I know.", she smiled sweetly and brought a plate full of pancakes up under my nose. "Now eat your breakfast."

The grim look on her face told me I didn't have any say in the matter, so I just took the plate out of her hands and jumped up to sit on the counter next to the kitchen island.

"Hey you wanna come with us to the park later?", Davis asked excitedly from his seat on the other side of the island, where he was wolfing down his third helping of pancakes, jam and whipped cream.

I glanced at the digital clock of the oven under the stove, concluding that I had about an hour to get ready before I had to leave if I wanted to be on time for that thing in the park.

"Well, I have to be there at around three anyway so why not.", shrugging I took a sip of coffee and started munching on my own meal.

"You do? What for? And why haven't I heard about this?", Kari questioned, frowning as she pushed my shirt aside a little to pick at my right side ribs.

It tickled but I managed to ignore it so I could enjoy my jam-covered pancakes.

"You haven't heard about it because I haven't gotten a word in edgeways since I got here Thursday between you constantly talking about your new friends–", I eyed said friends mischievously at this and they blinked in confusion. "–and Willis nagging about the new toys he's developing."

My sister narrowed her eyes suspiciously at me. "That may be so, but it's not like you've been actively trying to shut us up either."

Smiling good-naturedly I patted her head as condescendingly as I could. "I don't need to, I just tune you guys out and do something fun instead."

She smacked the side of my face, _hard_.

_Totally_ worth it for the sulky pout though.

"Mimi wants me at this weird DigiDestined meet or whatever.", I shrugged and popped a big piece of pancake in my mouth.

"_You_ know Mimi?", Yolei mock-gaped at me.

I wasn't sure whether she was trying to be funny or insulting. Probably a little of both, I hadn't known the teen for long after all.

"Sure, she was one of the kids I used to hang with when we lived here way back when."

"Really?", the purplette eyed me skeptically.

"It's not that strange! There weren't really a lot of people to choose from when we lived around here…", the truth was that each and every one of us were outsiders to all the other kids around. So we just banded together and had each other's backs. All the fun we had was an awesome bonus.

"Okay, whatever you say.", that goddamn leer was back again.

"Y'know… my older brother is going to that thing too.", TK said thoughtfully, flicking the radio on and trying to find a good song. "It's something the older 'Destined in town do every year, sort of like a counsel meeting or something."

Sipping at my coffee I observed as the blond fiddled with the radio. "They do it every year huh? Since when?"

"Since like… ten years ago I think."

I froze slightly, glancing at Kari I noticed that she did too. We locked eyes briefly before I got off the counter to put my dishes in the sink and she went to take my place next to the radio that TK was still working with.

"Are you two okay?", Davis asked in concern and looked between us like he was following a tennis match.

"Yeah… was just thinking that that's around the same time we met our partners.", Kari replied in as steady a voice as she could summon currently.

It was a bit of a half-truth. A lot of other shit had gone down around that same time…

Agumon was still scarfing down pancakes, as per usual eating like he hadn't even _seen_ food in a week. Gatomon seemed to have magically appeared in Kari's lap.

_How in the hell does she _do_ that?_

I chuckled mirthlessly and rubbed a hand against my neck. "Yeah… I'm gonna go ahead and take a shower and then we'll get moving alright?"

Kari nodded and hugged Gatomon close to her chest, the white cat-like Digimon snuggled in under the petite brunette's chin and shot me a sympathetic smile. I returned it as best I could.

The three other teens exchanged concerned looks, and as if he sensed a need for humor right at that moment Willis burst out of his room triumphantly placing his laptop on the kitchen island and grinning wickedly at me. I glanced at Terriermon, who had leapt up on the island and was shaking his head in resignation, and then looked back to my blond charge with a raised eyebrow.

"I found it!", Willis proclaimed victoriously, and pointed at the screen to which everyone's eyes seemed to have glued themselves.

And _that_ would be my cue to clumsily scramble into the bathroom as fast as my legs could carry me.

* * *

><p>Normally, when I was short on time and generally didn't want to linger under the hot sprays of water, it took me about five minutes to shower, another five to get dressed and then I was done. Seeing as how my hair was full of dried jelly it took me a wee bit longer… also the water was doing wonders for my growing headache.<p>

And it was nice and warm and calming in there, okay?

_Very_ contrary to what seemed to be going down on the other side of the door, though I'll be honest and say that I couldn't care less about what those kids were doing out there. I was quite content taking a long shower for once and not care about anything else. Things were finally panning out in our favor, and I was going to savor it while it lasted so help me _god_.

I had a well paying job, my sister and Willis were happy and satisfied, and they seemed to be making good friends from what I could tell. Hopefully so would I eventually…

Shaking my hair around some and checking to see that I had gotten all the jelly out of it, I drew a deep sigh and stepped out of the glass shower booth and onto the cold tile. I raised an eyebrow at my reflection in the half-length mirror, dark circles around my eyes that never really went away, a couple of bruises here and there, but biggest of them was marring the lower half of my left side ribs. Damn, still not healed yet.

The thing is this; on an assignment from the International Digital Service, for which I did jobs every now and then, I got pretty badly mangled and wound up with a punctured lung. That was like… two months previous and the bruising still hadn't gone away. Let me tell you, today's medicine is out of this world and all, but injuries like this was still a bitch.

And my lung was taking its slow, precious time with recuperating as well. Proven mostly by my getting extreme trouble breathing suddenly and seemingly from out of nowhere at times. I could even play soccer and do my jogs with no trouble at all. No, no, I broke down wheezing when I got too excited, or angry, or upset or whatever. Whenever my heart rate sped up too much, my damaged lung couldn't keep pace according to the doctors.

I sighed again as I wrapped a towel around my waist, momentarily forgetting the ongoing inferno of hormones in the other room, and put another on my head to dry my massive hair.

Freezing in the hall I watched as the group of teens still in the kitchen warring over who had the worst most-embarrassing-event-in-their-lives story. Huh. They didn't even notice me.

_Heh, so if I just sneak _quietly_ over to my bedroom _just_ over here and–_

I stopped short the second I opened the door to my room. There were three Digimon I didn't know and to my knowledge had no business being in my room, much less _sleep on my bed_. Before I could stop the frustrated impulse to turn around, put my hands on my hips and glare incessantly at my sister's forehead, I had.

I cleared my throat noisily to get the teens' attention. "Pardon me a moment children, but what exactly are those three doing sleeping on my bed?"

"Oh, uh…", Kari eyed me briefly, which made me painfully aware of my current state of undress and smiled sheepishly while rubbing the back of her head. "I had a feeling you'd crash on the couch, so I offered the extra bed to our guests."

"R_i_ght…", I narrowed my eyes at her, dragging out the 'i' for as long as my air supply let me.

"It's not that big a deal Tai, they're just sleeping on it.", she reasoned calmly, smacking the back of Yolei's head before her eyeballs fell out of her skull.

I raised a very skeptical eyebrow and turned to enter my room and rummage through my closet to find something to wear for the day, settling on a blue tee and brown shorts. "I wonder how you'd feel if I did that to you though."

"What was that?", Kari called from the other room, a hint of amusement evident in her voice.

"Oh nothing at all!", I shouted back, pulling on a clean pair of grey boxers and rubbing the towel against my hair furiously.

"So does your brother always walk around like that?", I heard Yolei ask excitedly.

I _swear_ I could almost _hear_ Kari's glare, and the dangerous silence that followed spoke volumes.

"Okay, I was just asking…", the purple-haired teen finally conceded reluctantly.

"He does seem to have an affinity for walking around with no shirt on though…", Willis' voice carried sarcasm, but Yolei didn't seem to have picked up on that.

"**_Really_**?"

"No!", Kari practically screamed.

Chuckling while I pulled on a pair of low cut socks I failed to notice movement in the bed behind me, and so the consequent battle cries scared the living crap out of me.

"Who are you human?", a fancy accent from a bird? Now that was new.

"Is he a robber? Can I beat him up?", a little blue lizard hopped from one leg to the other elatedly.

I gave them a severely unimpressed look from my new spot sitting on the floor in front of my closet. The next moment Agumon came rushing in and over to me, worriedly fussing all the while.

"Tai! Tai are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine. Just not used to being on my toes in my own home though.", at this I gave the two Digimon on my bed a very pointed look and proceeded to get up and put my shirt on.

My statement also seemed to give the two on the bed pause for a moment, and now I finally noticed the extremely tired looking Patamon still lying behind the two.

"Uh… '_your own_ _home_'?", the bird-like Digimon reiterated in puzzlement.

Again I gave them a most unimpressed look.

_What happened to the good old days when Digimon were supposed to be intelligent? _

My bitter inner muttering was interrupted when Gatomon entered the room also. After a bit of clearing up some confused facts Gatomon went about introducing the members of the little group in my room.

"Hawkmon here is Yolei's partner, and Veemon is Davis'.", each of the Digimon waved and smiled a little abashedly when they were gestured to. "And last but not least is Patamon, who is TK's partner."

The little orange guinea pig-like Digimon waved a wing/ear at me when his name was spoken, he still shot Veemon and Hawkmon reproachful glances from time to time before the two aforementioned Digimon exited the room to join their partners and steal the last bit of breakfast left.

"I take it the jumping into action spontaneously is common?", I asked the now air-born Patamon while we both slowly followed Agumon and Gatomon into the living room.

"Like you wouldn't believe.", Patamon sighed heavily, watching as Veemon battled Terriermon for the last pancake.

"Oh, I can believe a lot.", sending the little flying Digimon a wink and a smirk as I made my way over to break up the two-mon food fight.

Five seconds later I had my hands full of Digimon, with Davis rushing around and yelling about how they needed to leave if they wanted to get a patch of grass to play soccer on, the burgundy-haired teen wanting me to teach him my moves.

_Did I even agree to that?_

A loud beeping noise disturbed the companionable calm that had settled over the apartment, with the exception of Davis and the two Digimon I was holding out of reach of each other. It took me a moment to realize what that noise was and where it was coming from. It was my Digivice.

In one swift motion – and one I'm quite proud of in hindsight thank you – I tossed the two respective Digimon at their human partners, leapt over the side of the couch and darted into my bedroom to find my Digivice beeping and blinking on one of the bedside tables. As I picked it up it displayed a hologram above it that read: '**Warning! Unauthorized entry into human dimension!**' in big red lettering. It indicated a location as well.

"Damn it…"

_This does not bode well._

* * *

><p>MOAHAH, I'm so evil. I know it's a cliffhanger of hell, and I love writing them to be completely honest, but it's already eight pages in a Word document so. Yeah. Gonna stop here, hope you enjoy and I'll try to get an update done as soon as possible. I got <em>plenty<em> of college work to do…

Also, I'm totally making Willis a would-be inventor here. Just so you know. More on that later.

It is now almost five am, thank you good night.


End file.
